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Tag Archives: greatest weakness

It’s actually funny because what I’m blogging about today is something I’ve referenced to a while back, and I thought I had gotten it completely out of my system (I swear I did!). But seeing the whole situation happen elsewhere and seeing it end differently can really can make a man think, and so I have to put them down on paper.

Definitely one I could frame

So for those who know, I’ve been doing a few interviews lately. It’s been an interesting experience, kind of fun but also pretty stressful. One of their favourite questions seems to be: “What is your greatest weakness”.

Girls with attitude. Clearly my one weakness.

Such a loaded question.

Truthfully, I know my greatest weakness is overconfidence. But I never say that in an interview because it seriously sounds so cliche.

It’s funny but I have actually used this exact same image in a past blog to denote my greatest weakness as overconfidence -_-

This time, I just wanted to reflect on a situation where I seriously thought I was doing the right thing, thought I was so clever and had thought out all the possible scenarios and decided upon the best one. I had even talked it over with a very close friend, just to get an outside perspective.

I find that while I am bad at many things, one thing I’m good at is rationalizing things, whether it is to convince myself or other people. So between the two of us feeding off each other, I was ever so convinced I was doing THE RIGHT THING.

my problem isn’t a hesitance to do the right thing, but my perception of what the right thing IS.

What ended up happening here was I had overlooked one possible outcome – because in my mind, it was so astronomically unlikely and actually could be perceived as somewhat morally ambiguous IN MY OPINION. And so I completely discounted that scenario and went ahead with my planned course of action.

And I was content with me. I mean, obviously it wasn’t a happy ending or anything, but I perfectly executed what I set out to do so I couldn’t be anything but pleased.

PLEASED CAT IS PLEASEDDDD

Then I got the unique experience of seeing my whole situation occur to someone else. Obviously there were differences, but more parallels could be drawn than differences. As an observer, it was much easier to be objective, and yet in assessing the situation, I felt that the right thing for that person in that situation was to react like I had.

Fortunately he didn’t. And the situation, which started off so similarly to mine, ended up resolving so differently than mine (much better!).

And then I came to a realization – that I am far from omniscient and that my overconfidence is actually keeping me from maintaining the openest mind that I can. I rationalize my actions well, which ends up causing me to discount things, ultimately making me miss out on important possibilities.

ALL DEM FEEEEEEELS

So here’s to keeping an open mind.

Here’s to a year from now, I can blog about my greatest weakness and NOT use that same image.